Well, it was good that the girls managed to rescue the real Elizabeth, plus another woman, Marissa. But, I was not looking forward to telling Elizabeth about the death of her oldest son. Samantha could see that I was struggling with that before I went to talk with Elizabeth, so she went there first and broke the news to her. I’m quite sure she did a much better job of that than I would have done. I have a hard time with such things. After talking with Elizabeth and Marissa I went to my office in the tower. Samantha actually gave me the green light to leave the clinic. She said something about wanting some peace and quiet, though I’m not really sure what she meant by that.

After a little while Jennifer came along with Mandy, Erika and Steffie, and a big plate of donuts for all of us. Plus some fresh coffee too. It’s nice to be out of the clinic again. I had asked Rossana to check and see what might happen to those men at the studio. She said there was enough evidence found to put them all in prison for a few years. That part is good. Elizabeth really didn’t want to get involved with going to court, she just wants some quiet time with her children for a while. She’s quitting her job and is going to get a more normal job, as she put it.

Marissa isn’t sure what she is going to do and she was very nervous about being discharged from our clinic with nowhere to go. But Jennifer and Kat settled her fears by telling her she can stay here until she figures out what she would like to do. She was overjoyed by that news and said she would gladly work to pay for her stay with us. She had answered an ad to be a model and once she was inside that studio building, she was never allowed to leave. She seems very nice, is 20 years old, with no family except one older brother who wants nothing to do with her.

Celestine and Carmeline have already been visiting with her, which is nice. That will help her feel welcome. Now, there is still the matter of Nikolas and Andressa. Should we go after them, or leave them to those foreign agents? Personally, I think we should just leave them alone, however, that could mean we might meet up with them again at some point. And next time they might be harder to defeat. Time for a team leaders meeting concerning those two.

That afternoon a car drove up and it was our old friend Koffman again. That’s his second visit to us now, maybe he is beginning to change. He came in with another young woman and introduced her as Kerry Williamson. Cristy is already checking her out. She had run away from Koffman’s competitor and was found behind Koffman’s club hiding among his garbage where she had been looking for food. She hadn’t eaten for three days. So, his security guard brought her into his office and he allowed her to clean up and gave her some clean clothes as well. Then he gave her a good meal. Apparently she ate quite a bit!

Then he asked her if she would like to come here and perhaps get some kind of job with us. She said yes, since she didn’t know what else to do anyway. She was scared to go back onto the street to live and she was terrified that the other man, Koffman’s competitor, might find her and beat her again. He beat her once and laughed every time he hit or kicked her. I am really getting to dislike Koffman’s competitor and would like to teach him how not to treat women.

I have Galyna and Celestine here with me, plus Jennifer. Galyna and Celestine are very good at telling if a person is lying or not. We have several girls that have wonderful discernment abilities and I am going to use them more when interviewing clients and people who want to join us. Storm, Jewel and Snow are here as well, to add another layer of protection. Muffin was always good at helping with discernment too and she trained some of the other cats too. I decided that some changes were needed concerning how we do things around here.

Anyway, Kerry passed the test with all of them. Cristy said that Kerry’s father died when she was 8 years old and her mother died under “suspicious” circumstances about a year ago. I told Cristy to check the police report and coroner’s report to find out what they meant. She reminded me that isn’t legal, but I just looked at her. “Right, I’m on it Steve,” she said, smiling. I put my arm around her. “You’re an amazing girl Cristy,” I said, “and it’s nice having you back at work again.” We were all back in the library now and some of the girls were talking with Kerry.

I invited Koffman to stay for dinner, but he wanted to get home before it got too late. He also told me to be careful, he had heard news that someone was after me, though he didn’t know who, but he would let me know when he finds out. The next morning, as our group was just finishing breakfast, I started to sense trouble. “I’m sensing trouble,” I told Jennifer. “I just sensed danger too,” she said. “Trixie, silent Code Red please,” I said, “go tell the other cats to get ready Snow.” I then put her on the floor and she took off running quickly down the hall to the cat’s room.

Our teens were there and began putting the catpacks on all the cats. “Steve, there’s someone lying on the driveway,” said Dawn, “looks like a woman.” “Go get her Sky,” I said and off she went. “It’s Harley,” she said, “and she’s hurt bad.” “Bring her to the clinic right away,” I said. Now I told Trixie to upgrade the Code Red, so now it was ‘Code Red Attack’, and ‘Clinic Incoming’. “Misty, go reassure our clinic patients that they are safe please,” I said. “On it Steve,” she said. Aari contacted me right away since all Code Red alarms go to their chateau as well.

I told him that so far we don’t see any problems, except for finding Harley on the driveway. She is unconscious and has been badly beaten. Rather odd since she had gone back home to live with her parents. I hope her parents are okay. I wonder if this has anything to do with Koffman’s warning yesterday? We were able to contact them later that morning and they were fine. Apparently Harley and her father had a huge argument three days ago and Harley ran off. There never heard anything from her until I called. I asked Harley’s mom if she would like to come and be with Harley, but she said a very firm no.

She wanted nothing to do with that “little bag of trash”, as she put it, until she was ready to come back home crawling on her hands and knees and begging forgiveness. She then hung up. “Well, that was rather odd,” I said, “considering they were so happy to have her home again.” “Maybe Harley has changed,” suggested Kat. Celestine had been listening to the conversation so I asked her what she thought. “Something isn’t right,” she said, “but I’m not quite sure what it is.”

Well, I have formally closed our last case since we did what we should have, and that was finding and rescuing Elizabeth and her children. I decided to keep the Code Red alarm in place for a couple of days though, just in case. I have a bad feeling about all this and so does Jennifer, but for now we have to wait until we can talk with Harley and get her side of the story. Not many dull moments around this place…

The End of the Mysterious Mystery Case. But a new case has already begun. ©2026 Steve McLeod.